With production pushed back to 2021, you’d think updates on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 would either stall or be non-existent. That’s not the case though as information flows, slowly, but surely. Marvel Studios continues to scout directors behind the scenes in light of James Gunn’s unexpected firing by Disney a few months back. And there have been several contenders for the job, including Travis Knight of the upcoming Bumblebee and more recently, Adam McKay who helmed the multistarrer The Big Short.

Adam and Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige go back a long way. Back in this decade, McKay was one of the people working on Edgar Wright’s original Ant-Man before creative differences led to Wright falling out with the studio and Peyton Reed taking over. There was no bad blood however as McKay and Feige kept talking, discussing potential titles to adapt. One of the titles that came up was Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 and here’s what McKay said about the offer in the Happy Sad Confused podcast to Josh Horowitz.

We’ve talked a little bit. We were [also] kicking around the idea of Inhumans at one point. No, we’re always kind of talking. I think Feige’s just the greatest and I think what they’re doing over there is amazing.

What’s interesting, even more than this, is McKay’s interest at helming a different superhero movie, one that currently belongs to Fox’s slate.

Silver Surfer is the one I wanna do. I would do anything to do Silver Surfer because visually that would just be like you could do what the Wachowskis did with Speed Racer with the Silver Surfer. At the same time, there’s a great emotional story in there where the guy has to make the choice, Norrin Radd has to save his planet. That would be the one, but I think Fox owns the rights.

Of course McKay was elated to learn that Disney has bought Fox, allowing for characters such as the Silver Surfer, Fantastic Four and the X-Men to be used in the context of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Regardless of who ends up directing GotG Vol. 3, Disney still intends to use James Gunn’s original script. Kept under lock and key, a few people have been able to read it and according to SlashFilm’s Peter Sciretta, the reaction they’ve had to the script is pretty emotional.

Now that’s a strong response to a script-read, so one can only imagine what Gunn would’ve done as a director when capping of the Guardians trilogy. The previous movies were already packed with emotional moments, with Groot’s fate in 2014’s Guardians of the Galaxy and Yondu’s funeral in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 being particular standouts. It still remains to be seen if Disney will let the media-circus die down and at least consider bringing back James Gunn to finish his story.

#RehireJamesGunn anyone? Sound off in the comments below.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is currently without a set release date.